


Echo Park

by Anefi



Series: Anefi's Transformers Works [9]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Cyberverse
Genre: Other, Pre-Slash, lo-fi appreciation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-02
Updated: 2020-11-02
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:15:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27354082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anefi/pseuds/Anefi
Summary: Hot Rod thought he should probably leave.Soundwave clearly thought so too. “Get out.”He didn’t. “I liked your music,” he said instead. “The stuff that was playing—it sounded good.”
Relationships: Hot Rod/Soundwave (Transformers)
Series: Anefi's Transformers Works [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1918825
Comments: 11
Kudos: 58





	Echo Park

**Author's Note:**

> for the prompt soundwave+lofi :)

So the worst thing about Soundwave was how he was an absolute fragging troll. It was unrelenting. If you’d asked Hot Rod a year, five years, ten thousand years ago, he would’ve probably said something about his slavish devotion to Megatron, the assassinations, destruction, crushing neutral planets to dust, etc, but that was before he really _knew_ Soundwave, you know? All that was bad, obviously, though the devotion to Megatron didn’t turn out to be actually all that slavish, or even very strong, at the end, but definitely the _worst_ thing about him was when you were trying to say something serious, or remember something important, or generally focus on a thought for two seconds, he would turn on his big stupid unnecessarily powerful speakers and play, fragging, clown music, or crickets chirping, or the slowly building, sustained ringing of a gong, and it was always precisely calculated to be the _most_ effective distraction and basically, it was psychological warfare. You might think that being on the same side fighting against the infestation of tentacle-happy aliens who were trying to kill all their friends would mean catching a break, some immunity, maybe, but, as all the Decepticons could tell you, that was actually _worse_ , because then he was _around_ all the time, and got to _know_ you, and could figure out _exactly_ how best to drive you _up the fragging wall_.

Which meant that usually if Soundwave wasn’t in your immediate vicinity then good riddance, and you counted yourself lucky for the five astroseconds that lasted, because there were only seven people awake on the whole planet who weren’t guaranteed to try to shoot you on sight, and only so many places inside the sleeping titan that were actually in good enough shape with lights and stuff to hang out in. So Hot Rod was already having a bad day, because every day with their entire planet and the bitter remnants of its population being drained of life essence by Quintessons was a bad day, and this day had been particularly bad because in addition to failing to free anyone else from the Loop, the raid he’d lead had gotten Whirl and Clobber both hurt, and Perceptor was fixing them up, and Dead End seemed to be helping him at least somewhat willingly, but Hot Rod still felt like a joke failure pile of scrap about it. Anyway. On top of all that, Hot Rod was dragging himself all over the titan actually looking _for_ Soundwave, like, on purpose, trying to find him, since he’d said he had something else to do that was more important than going out into the ruins of Iacon with them and trying to save even one more Cybertronian (actually all he’d said was, “No,” all flat and commanding, but the rest was implied), and whatever else he was (an absolute slagger) Soundwave was good in a fight, so maybe they would have made it back without any casualties if he’d been there, and Hot Rod was ready to tell him so, to his stupid face.

This was all to say that when he actually managed to track Soundwave down in the cold, shuttered command module, he expected him to be like, boosting the shriek of talons on steel to a frequency that could actually cause cortical damage, or putting the finishing touches on a video compilation of all Hot Rod’s greatest moments attempting to make a plan – complete with laugh track – or plotting to kill them all, not that it would take much. Instead, he was slumped in a command chair, optics and sensors at dim half-power. His speakers were playing something weird: actual music, simple rhythms layered with repetitive strings of melody at the tempo of a slow spark-pulse, floating out of him and wrapping close around the still, thick air of the room. Out of her dock, Laserbeak was all but invisible until sharp red optics flashed from her perch on Soundwave’s gauntlet, meeting Hot Rod’s while he stalled out in the doorway. With deliberate slowness, she turned and pressed the top of her evil pointy head to the underside of Soundwave’s stupid pointy chin in what non-Decepticons might mistake for something like a nuzzle. She’d been keeping watch for Soundwave, clearly, in this bizarrely vulnerable moment, but for some reason, she’d let Hot Rod find him like this. Soundwave’s visor slowly powered up, and his other hand reached to smooth down her flight-plates. That strange, lilting music cut off when he noticed Hot Rod’s presence and stiffened.

“Hot Rod,” he said acidly.

“Uh. Hey, Soundwave,” he said. “What was—What are you doing in here?”

The angry red of his visor seemed to narrow. “I _was_ performing immersive analysis of all Quintesson movement data observed by Laserbeak and the rest of you over the past 4.8 cycles. _You_ interrupted me.”

“Oh.” That—sounded like it probably could be useful. The last flickers of his anger went out all at once, and suddenly, Hot Rod was just really, really tired. “Find anything?”

Another pause. “The analysis has to run for another 2.6 joors.”

“Okay.” Hot Rod thought he should probably leave.

Soundwave clearly thought so too. “Get out.”

He didn’t. “I liked your music,” he said instead. “The stuff that was playing—it sounded good.”

Now that he was looking, Soundwave was looking kind of—not as tired as Hot Rod, obviously, because he was too "superior" for that, but—worn. They had more than enough energon for everybody, from Maccadam's secret stash, but—everyone was under a lot of stress. With the occupation. Everybody else was having recharge fluxes. Maybe it all bothered Soundwave more than he let on. “Certain musical constructions boost analytical efficiency by as much as nine percent,” Soundwave said stiffly.

“Nine percent, huh?”

“Affirmative.”

Hot Rod still wasn’t walking away.

He had a really dumb idea.

“If you’re going to keep playing it, can I hang out in here? I wouldn’t mind boosting my processes by nine percent,” he said.

Soundwave was still staring, but Laserbeak chirred and bumped him on the chin again, looking very pleased with herself.

“I guess you do need every spare megabyte,” he said grudgingly, but for Soundwave, that was was hardly mean at all.

“Thanks,” Hot Rod said, and—he meant it.

After another awkward moment of silence, Soundwave’s speakers clicked on, and Hot Rod took a step into the room, then another. He picked a chair where Soundwave and Laserbeak could see him and deliberately turned his back, slung his legs over an armrest, and got comfortable. For the next two joors, he thought about the day’s raid—what had gone wrong, what they could do better next time—cross-referenced against the last few, and put together a few organized lists of updated tactical plans, things for everyone to work on individually and as a group. And if once in a while Hot Rod snuck a glance a Soundwave, so what? His chin was still stupid. With two of them in the command room, the temperature started to climb toward something comfortable. Hot Rod fell into recharge in the chair, kicking his foot to the rhythm of the lofi.

**Author's Note:**

> [stream](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qap5aO4i9A)


End file.
